rotten at the core
by leradny
Summary: You are the rarest and most treasured of the colours.


_rotten at the core_

-

Prestigious. Revered. Higher than Lord Holders.

That is a queen, and that is also what you are. You are the breeder, or rather the rider of one. Everyone in the Weyr is at your beck and call, and that gives you such a feeling of power that you sometimes can't handle it and make bad decisions because you didn't bother to check with someone else. But it's nothing that no one can't forgive.

You are the rarest and most treasured of the colours--gold. You are always the goldrider, because your dragon is a gold dragon, sometimes _the_ gold dragon, and never mind that she's usually only one in about two or three during a Pass. If stone could creak, your Weyr _would _from all that extra bulk. But no one cares--it is their _honour_ to feed and oil and bathe all these humungous blue-eyed beasts, because they are queen dragons, _gold_ dragons.

(_Your_ dragon is actually rather orangey when you look at her in the right light, but once again no one cares.)

You are greeted at every Gather by the Lord Holder himself, mourned at every Fall--because you are the queen and you are in _danger_, by the Egg!

When in actuality you are at the lowest point of all in the queen's wing, lumbering along with your flamethrowers and lucky enough to catch one clump of Thread in the entire day before it hits the ground. (Oh, that was stone it was falling on--but it can't hurt to make sure.)

They watch your every move. You pick at your food, and they notice.

Is there anything they can do for you, they ask, and you refrain from snapping at them in order to reply quite civilly that no, you wouldn't _think_ of bothering them. But their concern was appreciated anyway. And they leave in a fit of giddiness, as happy as if you had given them the highest compliments.

You sit there on your dragon in Threadfall, forearms poised with flamethrower in hand. Since your dragon cannot flame, you do it for her. She lays the eggs and you do the flaming--it has always been accepted. She can't chew firestone anyway--fair trade.

Sometimes you wonder if the only thing that makes you different from the ground crews is the fact that you're on a dragon. You sweat while you work, just as they do, and the flames are that much hotter when you've got a beast the size of a mountain under you.

You use up ten times more oil than any green or maybe a blue, and whatever for? For more of the little beasts, that's what, and nobody expects you to do anything else but keep track of things and use your flamethrower every now and then.

Sometimes you poke at your bicep when all is well, no Thread in sight, and get surprised when you realise that there's _muscle_ there--thick, bulky muscle that could leave your shoulders looking like a man's for all that weight you've got to carry for your dragon.

So you fret and worry about looking feminine, then remember--you're a queen! Those hold lasses, they'll probably worship you for having these arms and start bulking up themselves at home to look like you.

All right, so maybe that won't happen. But still, nobody notices that extra inch of cloth your trusted seamstress measures on you for that new Gather dress.

You write out records of tithes, keep track of proceedings in the Weyr, every year or so you've got to sleep with the new Weyrleader (which may or may not be a good thing), you keep your dragon from eating the Candidates when they're out on the Sands, and your dragon is doing nothing but what all animals do, from humans to birds. (Especially birds.)

You feel a little bit empty inside when everyone's squealing over your new clutch (just like an auntie! That always irritates you)--all that work and you're either a prissy little queen or the most beautiful and feminine woman on Pern. Never just _a dragonrider_.

Empty, and that's why you pick at your food sometimes.

_But you have me_, your dragon--_your queen_--says, _and I will never leave you_.

And that makes you feel a little better.

But sometimes it isn't enough.

-  
**Notes:** I wanted to write about an _anonymous_ goldrider, and this is what came out. Just like I wanted to write about an anonymous (female) greenrider. These are about dragonriders that Miss Anne McCaffrey has not written about and probably never will write about, because they are not famous or insane or disgustingly fat. Or the very first Weyrwoman whose queen had a sizable clutch. Or a queenrider whose dragon got killed in a mating flight. Or that same queenrider whose brownrider lover...

Never mind.

Just let it suffice to say that I am writing about Regular People, because I didn't see any in the books.


End file.
